I Promise to Walk With You for Half of my Life’s Journey - Chapter 16

The rumors struck Cheng Sutong in the most direct way possible.

It was a Friday lunch break when she went to the restroom. The voices of two girls drifted in from outside her stall. They were from the neighboring class; she had heard of them before but did not know them well.

“Hey, did you hear? About Cheng Sutong from Class 7?”

“I know, I know. The one who gets kept behind by Teacher An every single day.”

“It is more than just that. I heard Teacher An even buys things for her. Health supplements, imported ones.”

“Are you serious? That is a bit much.”

“Tell me about it. And have you noticed? The way Teacher An looks at her is not quite right.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just, you know, that look. A particularly gentle look. Have you ever seen Teacher An be gentle with anyone?”

There was a brief silence followed by low laughter filled with the excitement of uncovering a secret.

“It could not be that kind of relationship, could it?”

“No way. Teacher An is a woman.”

“So what if she is a woman? What era are we living in anyway?”

The voices gradually faded, accompanied by the splashing sound of the faucet. Cheng Sutong stood inside the stall, feeling cold all over. She turned on the faucet and rinsed her hands repeatedly with freezing water. The stream hit her skin with a slight sting, but it could not wash away the echoes of those words in her ears.

That kind of relationship. A gentle look. Special treatment.

Sutong was not afraid of gossip itself. She thought this might be love, or perhaps just a form of dependency; she could not tell the difference. If the rumors were false, she would ignore them completely. If they were true, however, Sutong’s heart skipped a beat at the thought. When she pictured the face of Teacher An, the conflicting feelings of fear and the desire to be close became intertwined. Even if it were true, her greatest fear was that Teacher An would be harmed because of her.

The first class of the afternoon was physics. As Cheng Sutong walked into the classroom, she could feel the gazes of her classmates scrutinizing her with judgment. She kept her head down and walked quickly to her seat, taking out her books to focus on her studies. Her deskmate, Song Qingqing, stood by the side of her friend. Qingqing patted her and said, “Sutong, just be yourself. Do not turn into a little ostrich just because others are talking nonsense without knowing the facts. I will always be your best friend, and I will always support you.”

Sutong responded with a small smile. “Thank you.”

An Chuxin entered the classroom on time. She was wearing a light blue shirt today, which made her complexion appear even fairer. As she stepped onto the podium, her gaze habitually swept across the class, pausing for a brief moment on Cheng Sutong.

Halfway through the lesson, An Chuxin asked a question. “Who can explain how to determine the direction of the Lorentz force?”

The classroom was silent, and no one raised a hand. The eyes of An Chuxin scanned the room and finally landed on Cheng Sutong.

“Cheng Sutong,” she called her name.

Cheng Sutong froze. She could feel the eyes of the entire class instantly focusing on her like countless blinding spotlights that made it hard to look up. She stood up slowly, her mind a total blank. Her lips moved, but she could not make a sound.

“Use the left hand rule,” An Chuxin prompted, her voice calm. “The palm, the magnetic field lines, the four fingers.”

Cheng Sutong looked at her left hand, but her fingers shook uncontrollably. She knew the answer; of course she knew it. But in this moment, with everyone watching her, she was so nervous that she could not utter a single word. Time flowed by, and each second felt as long as a year. An Chuxin looked at her, and her brow furrowed slightly. It was not a look of blame, but one of worry. However, Cheng Sutong could not read that. She only saw the furrowed brow and heard the deafening thud of her own heart.

“I, I do not know,” she finally squeezed out the words.

A few snickers broke out in the classroom. An Chuxin’s expression did not change. “Sit down,” she said, and then she called on another student.

Cheng Sutong collapsed back into her chair. She buried her face in her arms and closed her eyes. Her vision was plunged into darkness, but the voices became even clearer.

“That kind of relationship, right?” “The way Teacher An looks at her is not right.” “A particularly gentle look.”

Was it gentle? Cheng Sutong suddenly remembered that An Chuxin truly was very gentle with her. The hand handing her water in the hospital, the hand helping her get a book in the library, that new umbrella on a rainy night, the simple text message every morning, and the time they spent together in private. Those were small, clumsy moments of tenderness.

After school, Cheng Sutong did not go to the office. She carried her backpack and walked out of the school gates alone. The sky was gloomy, and it looked like it was going to rain again. She did not have an umbrella, so she just walked aimlessly through familiar streets, past the noisy market, and finally stopped at the entrance of a residential complex. It was the complex where An Chuxin lived. She had only been there once to drop off some forgotten materials, but she had remembered the address.

Cheng Sutong stood under the eaves of a convenience store across from the complex, staring at the building. She did not know which floor or which unit An Chuxin lived in. She just looked at the lit windows, imagining what An Chuxin was doing behind one of them. Was she grading homework? Was she calculating medical expenses? Or did she also think of her occasionally?

The rain began to fall. The drizzle slanted in, wetting her pant legs and her backpack. But she did not move; she just stood there like a fool stubbornly waiting for an answer. After an unknown amount of time, a familiar figure walked out of the complex. An Chuxin was holding a black umbrella and carrying a thermal container, walking in a hurry. Her head was down as if she were deep in thought. It was not until she reached the entrance of the complex that she suddenly sensed something and looked up.

Across the street, through the curtain of rain, their eyes met. An Chuxin was visibly stunned. She stood still, looking at Cheng Sutong on the other side. The girl was standing under the eaves, soaked through, her eyes red like an abandoned puppy. The traffic light turned green. An Chuxin quickly crossed the road and walked up to Cheng Sutong.

“Why are you here?” Her voice was anxious. “Why do you not have an umbrella? Why are you not at home?”

Tears welled up without warning, mixing with the rain and blurring her vision. Looking at her crying, An Chuxin felt a sharp pang in her heart. She raised her hand to touch her but stopped in mid air. Finally, she just tilted the umbrella toward Cheng Sutong.

“Come home with me first,” she said. “You will catch a cold like this.”

Cheng Sutong shook her head and took a step back. The hand of An Chuxin froze in the air.

“What is wrong?” An Chuxin asked.

“Teacher An,” Cheng Sutong finally spoke, her voice thick with tears. “In the future, can we please stop meeting in private?”

The sound of the rain suddenly became very loud. It poured down as if the entire world were collapsing. An Chuxin stood there, and the angle of her tilted umbrella was frozen in place.

“What did you say?” Her voice was almost swallowed by the rain.

“They say our relationship is not normal. They say I get high grades because of you. They say you…” She could not go on. Those filthy words were stuck in her throat, making it hard to breathe.

An Chuxin remained silent for a long time while the raindrops pattered against the umbrella.

“So,” An Chuxin finally spoke, “do you believe what they are saying?”

Cheng Sutong almost shouted her reply. “I do not believe it! And I do not care about the rumors about me. But I cannot stand you being talked about like that. You are already working hard enough. I do not want you to risk losing your job because of me. I do not want you to face the risk of being hurt by gossip because of me.”

An Chuxin looked at her face, which was soaked with rain and tears. She saw the bottomless fear and pain in her eyes, and her heart ached terribly. She remembered the words of the grade director, the looks floating in the air, and the way this girl sat in the classroom too afraid to look up.

Protect each other. This thought was stronger in both of their minds than ever before. But what if the way to protect someone was to push them away? Was this young girl not pushing her away right now? An Chuxin closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The cold air of the rain entered her nose and chilled her all the way to her lungs. When she opened her eyes again, all emotion was buried, leaving only coldness.

“Fine,” she said. The single word was clean and decisive.

The crying of Cheng Sutong stopped abruptly. She looked up at An Chuxin in disbelief.

“Starting tomorrow,” An Chuxin continued, her voice devoid of any ups or downs, “I will swap classes with other teachers. I will no longer be your physics teacher. You do not need to come to the office anymore. All questions can be asked publicly during class.” She spoke slowly and clearly, ensuring every word was delivered accurately. “As for the rumors,” An Chuxin paused, “do not worry. I will handle them.”

Cheng Sutong did not expect An Chuxin to agree so readily and so resolutely. She did not want them to be apart; she was just scared and in pain and did not know what to do. But she had never truly thought about leaving An Chuxin.

“An Chuxin! I do not want to just be taken care of by you. I also want to catch your exhaustion steadily. My shoulders might not be broad, but they are enough for you to lean on when you are tired. Let me be your harbor too. Even if it is small, it will always be calm.” These words screamed in the heart of Sutong, but they were never spoken.

“Teacher An, I…”

“Go back,” An Chuxin interrupted her, shoving the umbrella into her hand. “Remember to bring an umbrella in the future.”

She turned and walked into the rain without looking back. Her black silhouette quickly disappeared into the rain, leaving Cheng Sutong alone, holding the umbrella that still carried a lingering warmth. She stood under the eaves of the convenience store looking at the empty street.

The rain fell harder, and the light from the streetlamps blurred in the puddles like crying eyes. Cheng Sutong slowly crouched down and buried her face in her knees. The umbrella slipped from her hand and hit the ground with a thud. The rain soaked her hair, her clothes, and every inch of her skin, but she did not feel the cold. She only felt that the place in her heart that had just begun to warm up was turning cold and hard, finally freezing into a block of ice that could never be warmed again.

So, this was how much it hurt to be protected. In the world of adults, even tenderness had to be wrapped in hurt. Cheng Sutong crouched in the rain for a long time until her legs went numb. She picked up the umbrella from the ground, opened it, and walked into the rain. The umbrella was large enough for two people, but now she was alone.

She walked slowly, and every step felt like she was treading on cotton. The shops on both sides of the street glowed with warm yellow lights, their glass windows reflecting people eating, chatting, and laughing. That warm, ordinary life felt so distant now.

When she reached her front door, Cheng Sutong took out her phone. There were two unread messages on the screen. The first was a weather forecast: “Heavy rain to rainstorms tonight, turning cloudy tomorrow.” The second message was from that familiar number. It was sent an hour ago, shortly after they had parted in the rain. It contained only two words: “Sorry.”

Cheng Sutong stared at those two words for a very long time. Then she looked up at the storm in the night sky and whispered softly, “The person who should say sorry, is me.”

The sound of the rain swallowed her whisper. On the other side of the city, at a certain window, An Chuxin stood in the darkness looking at the message on her phone screen that had been read but not replied to, and she slowly closed her eyes.

Support